Sidney is a long way to travel for even the most devoted of Montana craft beer fans. That’s where Tony Reindl’s Montana Canning Co. comes in.

“Tony provided a great opportunity for us to bridge the distance gap. Us out here in the east have such a distance to go to get our product to consumers,” said Travis Peterson, owner of Meadowlark Brewing in Sidney, not far from the North Dakota border.

The only other option in mobile canning at the time was based in Spokane and won’t come all the way to Sidney despite Plentywood ties, Peterson said.

Montana Canning “was a way to support another Montana business, and that’s near and dear to our hearts. We want Montana to be successful,” Peterson said. “It’s made it easy to get our beer into other people’s hands even from Sidney.”

In May, Meadowlark became the first brewery to use Reindl’s canning services, but now he cans for Mighty Mo Brewing Co. in Great Falls, a brewery in Billings, one in Livingston (where Montana Canning is based) and two breweries and a cider house in Bozeman.

Reindl said he got involved in Montana’s craft beer industry as an electrician wiring breweries.

“Canning was just an idea that turned into a reality,” he said. “I love the industry, and I figured out, yeah, it is a plausible idea.”

From the beginning of the canning business, Reindl’s goal was making craft beer more available for the public.

(Photo: COURTESY PHOTO)

“My hope is it means breweries can produce more beer and distribute it through different channels,” he said. “Montana is restrictive on the amount you can serve in a tap house. In a small brewery, that makes a world of difference. I like to think I help bring great beer to the Montana public. A lot of people don’t make it to Sidney.”

Reindl partners with a Missouri company to print the beer labels.

Reindl will be back in Great Falls for another round of canning at Mighty Mo in March. The brewery was among the first to really get into mobile canning. Reindl brings the canning equipment from brewery to brewery, saving them the expense of buying it themselves.

He does 12 and 16 oz. cans, churning out 20-24 16 oz. cans a minute.

“On an average day, we do 6,000 cans in seven hours,” he said.

Kalispell brewery adds life to downtown

And, of course, a side benefit to the canning business is trying the beer.

“I like to drink about everything they have and really understand what they’re brewing the beer to taste like, what their style is,” he said. “I don’t favor one beer over another. I like to drink for the season, and I can appreciate a blond as much as a smoked porter.”

Beer is “liquid gold” in the operation, “worth money and every ounce counts,” he said. Canning often requires balancing temperature and carbon dioxide levels. The higher the carbonation, the colder the beer must be to can.

(Photo: COURTESY PHOTO)

“Every facet, those numbers matter,” he said.

In the next month or two, cans of Meadowlark’s beer — among them Teddy Roosevelt American Badass IPA — will reach Great Falls stores.

Cans make a lot of sense, even for growler devotees. They’re “easy to carry, easy to take to the ski hill, camping or golfing,” Peterson said. And, he added, recyclable.